American novels

This quote is from a novel titled The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. This displays the main character’s view on growing up. A frequent theme in American culture is coming of age, which is a young person’s journey from childhood to adulthood. This theme is present in many American novels, such as Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, which is one of the most popular books that contain this theme. Also, there are examples of…

Orange written by Karen Yamashita is a novel that takes place in Los Angeles, California featuring seven main characters. The Tropic of Orange is based off of a one week schedule in which each character narrates the novel. Yamashita chooses Los Angeles for the storyline because it is a city that is rich in cultural diversity. The Tropic of Orange deals with American concepts such as gender inequality, the American dream, the melting pot, and stereotyping. This novel gives seven characters of…

issues of identity, hybridity, exile and displacement. Though this work of Abu Jaber has already received the attention of many critics, I chose this novel of hers because of its relation with the Arabs' exiles quest of their own definition of identity and cultural heritage within the Jewish community in Israel. Further, the ethnic minorities in the novel are at some point similar to the ones in Israel regarding its diversity. Halls in his The Question of Cultural Identity (qtd. in…

to American and in their native land. I admit to never deeply considering this subject before. The subject of Dominicans as immigrants to American was never an interest to me. I now have a new found interest regarding Dominicans in America. Surprisingly to me I found peeping in on the character’s lives from the Dominican very engaging. The book kept my attention from beginning to end. I was surprised to have consistent interest because I have a new found lack of attention to reading novels in…

The House On Mango Street is a unique novel that tells the story of Esperanza Cordova, a twelve-year-old Latin American girl growing up in a rough Chicago neighborhood. Esperanza and her family have moved around more times than Esperanza can remember. The latest move brings Esperanza and her family to a little red house on Mango Street. It is nothing like the house her parents have fed her and her siblings stories of; there is no white picket fence or big yard to play in, only two oak trees the…

The intriguing novel by Yaa Gyasi, Homegoing, is a truly memorable and sprawling tale of a family split between Africa and America. Following the descendants of an Asante woman named Maame, the novel paints a complex picture of the intertwined histories of Ghana from the 1700’s to present day. Unlike many historically prevalent stories, Homegoing uses historical accounts written by Africans and African-Americans to center each chapter of the book around important historical moments. These…

In Gish Jen’s book, Mona in the promised land is the story of a Chinese-American family that lives and an upper-class suburb of New York. The story follows Mona an eighth-grade second-generation Chinese American who is struggling to find her self in a new community where she’s only seen as Asian. As I read this novel Mona appeared to me to be just the typical teenager someone is trying to find themselves in fit into their peer group. I think we see Mona struggle in crystal-clear detail from the…

John Irving comes up. The name of the novelist and screenwriters tends to have that effect, especially after winning an Academy Award for his screenwriting. The now 74-year-old was born on the 2nd of March, 1942 in Exeter, New Hampshire. He’s an American citizen who was actually born by the name John Wallace Blunt Jr. He lived with his mother and stepfather as a kid and used to join wrestling competitions at his school. He would eventually keep on wrestling for at least 20 years, as a…

something valuable? Certain characters in the novel, The Great Gatsby tend to lie in order to achieve something as well. The themes, the nature of lies and deceit and the fallacy of the American Dream, pertain to the novel as a whole due to the actions the characters create or participate in. The author, Fitzgerald, includes certain behavior that his characters do that applies to the theme the nature of lying, that can affect the fallacy of the American Dream. The time period is set…

and Huck: The Road to Freedom Mark Twain wrote The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn published in 1885 primarily for an adult audience. The novel was written two decades after the Emancipation Proclamation but slavery was still a big part of life during the 1880’s because of the Jim Crow laws which limited the rights of African Americans. Along the banks of the Mississippi River, a 14 year old boy named Huckleberry Finn (Huck) lived with his “pap”. Huckleberry Finn’s father was a…